


“shut up and eat your steak"

by elainebarrish



Category: Copycat (1995)
Genre: F/F, basically I'm gonna write fic for all the gay things sigourney is in
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-29
Updated: 2015-03-29
Packaged: 2018-03-20 04:15:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3636333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elainebarrish/pseuds/elainebarrish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"“It’s not like I have a choice,” Helen teases and hangs up, then tries to go back to her game of chess without smiling, her features carefully under control regardless of whether anyone was watching, and she’s knows they’re not, that she’s alone. (She tries to keep her feelings for MJ under as much control as she can, and that includes not smiling or sighing dreamily whenever she gets off the phone with her.)"</p>
            </blockquote>





	“shut up and eat your steak"

She’s not paying attention, MJ can tell that by the dead silence on the phone that comes after she finishes what she was saying, something about a new case, something to do with a double homicide and a spate of cases that look the same, something work related that she’s not really concentrating on either. They’re both thinking about random things, they’re both guilty of spacing out in the middle of sentences, and neither of them ever bothers to ask.  
“Helen?”  
“Oh, yes?” she shakes herself out of it, like she always does, takes another sip of bourbon.  
“Should I just bring the paperwork over later? Do you have anything in the fridge?”  
“That would probably be easier, and I doubt it.”  
MJ chuckles, shakes her head. “I’ll bring groceries with me, I’m cooking.”  
“Another hidden talent? Usually you bring takeaway,” she teases, smiling.  
“I haven’t eaten a home cooked meal in about two weeks, and it’s probably been even longer for you. Nothing can beat my steak. I’ll see you later?” she looks up, notices her new partner gesturing for her attention, looking uncomfortable, and the soft smile she hadn’t even noticed grow is quickly replaced with her trademark look of faint exasperation.  
“It’s not like I have a choice,” Helen teases and hangs up, then tries to go back to her game of chess without smiling, her features carefully under control regardless of whether anyone was watching, and she’s knows they’re not, that she’s alone. (She tries to keep her feelings for MJ under as much control as she can, and that includes not smiling or sighing dreamily whenever she gets off the phone with her.)

When she opens the door later MJ looks rushed, and she’s carrying more food than is necessary even for a surprisingly elaborate dinner for two. She mutters “evening” but proceeds to the kitchen without even being invited inside, dumping everything on one of the kitchen counters with a sigh.  
“You didn’t need to buy me groceries,” Helen mutters as she looks in the bags, watching as MJ starts to attempt to put things away (neither of them know where anything goes).  
“I bet all you have in your fridge is ketchup,” she rolls her eyes when she opens the fridge and finds she’s almost right; there’s jam and a single lonely egg too.  
“At least you get to say I told you so,” she smiles a little, still poking through one of the bags when MJ bats her hands away, delegating her over to the other side of the kitchen where her lanky frame hopefully won’t get in the way.

Not long after, the shopping is away and there’s glasses of wine to hand, and MJ is chopping something and humming.  
“Humming? I wouldn’t have expected that of you,” Helen smirks when MJ turns to look at her, smiling.  
“I can’t sing, so. Humming is the best you’re gonna get.”  
“Not even a little bit of singing?” she tries, but she’s immediately met with a glare that’s offset with a small smile.  
“Not even a little. Though I suppose that depends on how many glasses of wine I have.”  
Helen smirked and refilled MJ’s glass, eyebrow raised. “I look forward to it.”  
“Not until after dinner, I bet you have no idea how to cook the perfect steak.”  
“That’s fair,” she smiled, and took a sip of wine, and continued to watch MJ chop and prepare and make herself at home in the kitchen she barely knew how to use.

Helen gets assigned the duty of setting the table, and she seriously considers lighting the candles that are on it for a few moments until she decides that surely that’s far too obvious for what can barely even count as a first date, (though this is not the first time they’ve done this by a long shot, it’s just the first time that one of them has cooked), and instead moves the unlit candles out of the way. When they get take away they eat on the sofa, watching some terrible film that doesn’t have anything about police or murders or psychopaths in it, so she has to clear off stacks of books to make the table half usable.  
“Is there a single surface in this place that doesn’t have books all over it?” MJ complains as she brings the plates in, rolling her eyes at the disorganised stacks that littered the floor.  
“I keep the kitchen counters mostly clear,” Helen retorts, hoping that she hadn’t noticed the stack of things in one of the corners.  
“Yeah apart from that pile of reports next to the toaster.”  
“Here was me hoping you weren’t going to notice those. And I did say “mostly”.”  
“Shut up and eat your steak,” MJ smiled, rolling her eyes as they sat down, ignoring that the table still had a stack or two of papers on it.  
“This is amazing,” Helen managed a few moments later, while MJ just smiled, trying not to blush at the uncharacteristic praise.  
“I told you, didn’t I?”  
“I suppose you did,” she admitted, perhaps a little reluctantly.

Helen gets the job of clearing up, as is only fair, and MJ gets to swap places with her, being the one stood off to one side trying not to get in the way as she fills the dishwasher, surveying her efforts with a glass of wine.  
“You don’t stack the dishwasher very often, do you?”  
“Oh is it that obvious?” Helen laughed.  
“Maybe you’re just uncomfortable in the face of manual labour.”  
“Maybe I just make use of very little crockery as there’s only one of me.”  
“It is a big dishwasher for just one person,” MJ observed, smiling, head resting against the fridge.  
“It’s a big apartment for just one person,” she countered, her facial expression soft as she looked at the tiny woman standing in her kitchen, looking tired as only a big case could make her.  
“Come on, I’ll finish this later, let’s put a shitty film on and I’ll look over those files you brought with you and told me I wasn’t allowed to look at until after dinner.”  
“You’ve been so patient!” MJ grinned as she followed her slowly to the sofa, throwing herself on it with a sigh, though she was careful not to spill her wine.  
Helen handed her the TV remote and turned back to the files, glossy pictures of beautiful murdered girls already spilling onto the table as a romcom started to murmur in the background, just loud enough to hear if you concentrated, which neither of them were. MJ was leaving heavily against the back of the sofa, boneless and looking as though she was about to fall asleep, answering Helen's rapid questions with her eyes closed, smiling as she made connections between cases faster than anyone else had. Eventually she puts the files down and stacks them back into a haphazard pile, then she grabs the blanket off the back of the sofa and covers them with it, and they start to actually watch the film, regardless of whether it's halfway through. By the time it gets to the end they're asleep, curled up on the sofa.

She wakes up with a start, confused and disorientated by the darkened room that's lit with the glow from a small floor lamp and the television, which is still flickering around in the background. She searches for what woke her up, when MJ makes a small noise in her sleep, a distressed whimper that Helen knows well; MJ is having a nightmare, her face buried into the cushions of the sofa, her hands in tight fists. She wants to help but she delays for a moment, transfixed by the distressed look that MJ wears even in sleep, her mouth an unhappy downturned line, her brow creased. It's not what Helen had imagined when she'd thought about it, how she'd wished that MJ wore a serene smile as she slept, that she was untouched from past events in a way that Helen could never imagine.  
She reaches out, shaking her shoulder lightly, murmuring her name, and MJ wakes quickly, her entire body tensing before she collapses back into the cushions with a resigned sigh, the kind that told Helen this was far from the first time.  
"I'm somewhat of an expert when it comes to nightmares, considering my profession," she says quietly, not voicing what they both know, that she has them too. MJ sits up slowly and Helen moves back, back out of her personal space, and they'd both be lying if they said they didn't lament the loss.  
"It's nothing, everyone gets them," she tried, but Helen gave her a look that made it clear what she thought of that, and MJ sighed, looking at her hands fiddling with the blanket. "It's been worse since everything happened but you know, I'm a homicide detective, none of us exactly sleep easy."  
"The nightmares lessen, it just takes time." MJ knows a doctor voice when she hears it, and she looks at her in a way that suggests it's not a welcome change.  
"You're not my doctor, they already forced one of those on me at work, you don't have to try and psychoanalyse me."  
"I'm always psychoanalysing everyone, it's part of my charm," she smiled softly and slid her hand into MJ's, still warm with sleep, and she looked up, surprised by such a tactile response from the usually closed off woman.  
"Oh yeah, all that charm, that's why I'm here, obviously," MJ mutters as sarcastically as possible, fighting the smile that makes it's way across her face.  
"My charm, and because of my surprisingly comfortable sofa."  
"Don't forget that you have cable," they're both smiling softly, shyly, and MJ feels like giggling or something, like she's 15 years old, and the nightmare is long forgotten. Helen tries not to look at her lips, she honestly does, but MJ of course notices when she gives in, the quick flicker of her eyelashes that betrays what she was thinking, what she wants. MJ moves forward, rising onto her knees so that Helen has to look up to her for once, and then she leans forward, meeting Helen in the middle, smiling into a kiss she was never expecting to happen. Helen wraps her arms around her waist, smiling as MJ's hands go to the short hairs on the back of her neck, and when they pull apart she's still smiling, eyes reflecting the still flashing TV.  
"I knew you weren't just here for my cable," she says quietly, grinning as MJ collapses into laughter.


End file.
